And here’s the Koris team for DreadBall. Slippery lot.
Edit: updated version here.
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Quirkworthy 
Can you throw through a portal?
– Can you put portals in special hexes, like Sub-bench entrance, Strike zones, etc?
– What happens if a ball ends in an active portal? And in an inactive? (Second question is because rules says that no player can enter an inactive portal)
– What happens if a giant enters the portal hex?
– Can the referee use an active portal?
– What happens if a player is pushed to an inactive portal?
My initial reaction is that the portal rules are fairly involved, especially with the string of die rolls that ensue when actually using a portal.
I dislike opening a portal not counting as a player action, yet using a team token. It flies in the face of the base rules where a player can only be activated twice. Yes, you say you aren’t activating the player, but they do have the portal ability, and it could be a third token spent for actions associated with the player.
I also think the confusion rules can get in the way of the smooth Dreadball flow. I respect the concept of randomness, but I feel a table lookup can bog down the sequence, especially since non-Koris players can use the portals as well. Why not make it a 4+ test (2) with +1 die per player rank, MVP’s gain +1 as well as +1 per ability.
I think spending an Activation Token is a large enough cost to open a portal.. especially since both teams can use it.. so it goes both ways.. you open a portal near your 4 pt strike but your opponent now gets the ball in his end of the pitch and uses your previous portal to get into your half of the pitch.. so it works both ways… and it isn’t that complicated of a chart.. it also goes in order of Str/Speed/Skill/Armor with Str & Armor being 1 & 6.. not too complicated.. IMHO anywho…
as for the Koris themselves… Skill 3+ is potent.. but only 1 Striker… so I’m okay with it so far… and then as far as ball throws and bounces… there is very little reason to throw the ball into a portal.. it would end your rush unless it bounced to the right exit portal and into a player of yours front arc and they caught it… could happen.. but either making it a very random scatter or just having the ball not be able to go through the portal (something about needing a sentient mind to activate the portal or such would work as far as fluff goes) and just scatter off them ..
the other question is do Portals block LOS?
Except your opponent probably has a 5 somewhere, gets two less dice, and needs to get 2 successes. The math isn’t in their favor of getting through those portals.
Doesn’t go “both ways” in the way you are saying when one team has about double the odds to successfully use those “doors”.
You always “get through the portal”.. the question is just what shape are you in on the other side.. and actually, re-reading the Confusion.. not only do you lose the rest of your Activation, but you can’t activate again in the current Rush!!! that’s actually pretty potent.. it does mean it can backfire on your Koris.. your Striker goes through, rolls a 6, and even on 5 dice needs two 5’s to not lose his turn and his future activation that turn!!! so is the intention of the Portal for the other team to be “shot in the dark” as it were… or is that “lose future activations in the current Rush” too much and should be removed?… maybe reduced to -1 dice to all test for the remainder of the rush? to represent the Confusion.. you already are letting your opponent place your model in an open hex with any facing and losing your activation …
You are still acting like the seldom chance it happens to the Koris is anywhere near as bad as the rest of the teams. The portals are a reliable tool for Koris and a dangerous game for the other teams.
The portals are not as much of a liability as you are making them out to be. This is the same stance people were taking on the Judwan with “But they can fail a pick-up/you can just bash them” sort of suggestions. Yes these things can happen, but not at fair enough odds. You have to look at the percentages, and this Koris template is Upper tier and almost setting a new standard.
What if the Portal use is slightly less dangerous for non-Koris players? Instead of losing any further activations this Rush with less than 2 successes, you only get that result if you score zero successes, if you get 1 success, you continue your action, and can be activated again, but at a -1 dice to all checks until your next rush, like the “Can you keep it down?” Event card. It makes the portals more tempting for the opponent, and therefore more dangerous for the Koris to drop without thinking carefully about it.
Actually, the wording would be better as: Use a portal, ? check (1) Test Fails: you are placed adjacent to an active portal of your opponent’s choice and that model can not be activated again this Rush. Test succeeds: You are placed adjacent to an active portal of your opponent’s choice. You may continue your action and may activate this model again, but all checks are at a -1 penalty until your next Rush. Test doubles: You exit an activated portal of your choice, you continue your action. Modifiers: +2 dice with Spinner.
If your open to suggestions. I like pile driver or threatening for the guards better then gotcha. Pile driver seems to fit the concept art better. Using 4 legs to lift opposing players off the ground and slamming them to the ground with 4 arms seems appropriate. Either that or Threatening.
Gotcha! is pretty powerful… and with it pretty prevalent in the Mechanites Guard Builds I’ve seen.. kinda scary that everyone’s going to be throwing -2 threat hexes and trapping people when they fail to evade… also, I see Pile Driver as only something a super strong and large model can do… the MVP Koris from DBZ isn’t very large.. and Threatening is again, usually something I expect with intimidating models.. the Koris aren’t that based on the art & 1 model I have to base this off of =p
It’s just that gotcha seems be be getting thrown around a bit too much. While I see your point with Pile Driver having 4 legs and arms would not require as much power to lift an opponent than a guy with only 2. I also came up with an original ability for them: Grab and Smash – as part of a slam they grab their opponents either two arms (possibly through a skill check) them smash them with the other 2. If the slam is successful opponent is -1 dice to armor checks.
It’s just that gotcha seems be be getting thrown around a bit too much. While I see your point with Pile Driver having 4 legs and arms would not require as much power to lift an opponent than a guy with only 2. I also came up with an original ability for them: Grab and Smash – as part of a slam they grab their opponents either two arms (possibly through a skill check) them smash them with the other 2. If the slam is successful opponent is -1 dice to armor checks.
If grab is successful but slam is not opponent is held in place and is -1 to dodge or slamback attempts. Possible strength check to break hold.
I don’t know why I can’t reply to a reply.. oh well.. @ Earth Dragon, it isn’t like the Portal Placement is free… if you want to playtest it as being an action related to a Jack see how that works.. maybe it is too powerful not to count against the Action Count for that Jack… open a portal, step forward grabbing the ball, roll double success, move through portal right into 4-point strike zone (assuming you put one there on a previous Action Token), roll 1d6, roll 5 dice on (variable 4+ or 3+ for the Koris Jack) (2) test.. likely success. Stop action. 2nd action = throw 1 dice on 3+ skill for success 2/3 of the time… or if you have portal near 3 & 4 point hexes, teleport portal out onto 3 point shot and get 2 dice at 3+ to score and likely generate 2 Fan Checks.. maybe that is too good… and if so, it will get nerfed =p in theory =p if we playtest it and get back to Jake…
Oh, and no feedback about Portals Blocking LOS or ball effects yet? I’d think those would be important tidbits!!!!
I have play-tested them with 3 landslides for the Koris so far. Veer-myn, Void, and Robots. All middle of the packers
That 2/3rds chance on one dice to score is about the same percentage a Veer-myn Striker has at a 3 pt shot when planted (3 dice), except he fumbles it every 5 attempts to pick it up, versus the Koris Jack fumbling it every 5th game (that’s them trying to pick it up every rush. Add in the Striker and now your talking about having a fumble every 6th-7th game). With 3 skill, you are also able to pass the ball fairly successfully if you don’t double the pick-up, giving a fresh Jack (or better yet, the lone striker, which if available, has over a 90% chance of successfully getting the ball passed to him at max range) to work with who hasn’t used any tokens yet. This is one of the few teams who would have such a high chance of fielding a ball, they’d actually want to attempt it near the start of the rush in order to plan accordingly on the off chance the initial player didn’t double.
I’m a fan of the guards. I don’t agree that giving a 3rd team out of 24 (23 really since FF no longer apply after Brokkrs) is a rampant use of the Gotcha skill. Hand it out where it need to go. I’m assuming Mutants will get that as an option as well, but honestly, Mutants and Mechanites seem like a nightmare and should have been thought through a little better at a concept level…..but I won’t get into that here, and we’ll have to wait and see if mutants are a little more “controlled”.
Here’s the worse part……I understand why they have a 3 skill. 4 Skill seems like it would be a struggle. BUT that’s because Jacks are underwhelming, and the team shouldn’t get “fixed” around a sub-standard position by overcompensating somewhere else. This also wouldn’t be needed if they were a 2-4-2 spread instead of a 1-5-2 set-up. But that is tragically locked in at this stage of the game. This team is borderline stuck to be OP or a little on the weak side.
In my opinion, it would be better to actually favor that weakside versus giving the Nameless and Corp a run for their money on top. As referenced earlier, there is a deeper issue that needs to be addressed to bring the “field” up.
It seems we’re the 3+ Skill is strong parade. But it really is. I’ve no issue with these statlines, but they compare so favourably to other teams that I think they may need to lose the card and cost slightly more. Maybe swap it for a dice and +2 points for the Striker, +1 for Guards.
I like the limited roles, and coupling them with extra mobility for the Jacks thanks to portals should make them viable. But those jacks all being Skill 3+ makes them serious attacking threats.
Strikers have about a 93% chance to successfully go through the portal
Guards and Jacks are at about a 96%
If you moved an average of 3 of your players through the portals every turn, you still would go through a quarter of your games with no failures. In the 3 games I’ve played, They failed once between the 3 games since we haven’t been using the portals nearly 3 times a turn.
And how were you playing the Portal as far as blocking LOS or affecting the ball? Bouncing off of it (or only if it lands on it?) or passing right through it?
Also, and this is dirty.. if the portal blocks LOS, why not drop it in front of the 3/4 point strike and then defend the 2 side hexes so completely block scoring attempts?
maybe the portals should be like the Ref and can’t be placed in yellow or red strike hexes?
And in your games, did anybody from the other team try to move through the portal?
Finally, and I say this only as the voice of dissension, isn’t it true that most people are going to have a hard time vs a team with new rules that they’ve never played before? To be fair, you should take the opponent, and give your friend the Koris, and see if they continue to win by landslides or if you can stop them knowing how they work… for completeness sake anyway!!!
We’ve been playing catiously, haven’t “thrown” balls through portals, have them block LOS, and you can’t summon them in places the ref can’t go.
All that would need clarifying, but if you can summon portals to block your strike hex……..
Please make them playable for Deadzone, Jake! This is the Stargate type force I’ve been waiting for! 🙂
Well, you never know who’ll turn up next in the Rebel forces 🙂
As for Ada-Lorena, here my french translation for Koris (of course, this isn’t final!)
WU-LING WANDERERS
Comme si une équipe de Teratons capables de se téléporter ne suffisait pas, une des nouvelles venues dans les équipes de DreadBall est l’équipe Koris, les Wu-Ling Wanderers, qui peuvent créer de minuscules trou de ver à travers l’espace !
Les Koris sont un groupe déroutant à étudier, tant à cause de cette technologie de trou de ver, que de leur incapacité à dire la vérité. Quant à eux, ils trouvent extrêmement étrange l’attente des autres races pour les faits directs et non-enjolivés. Si vous avez raconté une fois une histoire, ou relayé une information, alors pourquoi raconter la même chose la fois suivante ? Bien sûr, il serait bien plus intéressant, et intellectuellement plus stimulant, voire bien plus amusant de rajouter une touche personnelle. Pour pimenter les choses. Une nouvelle motivation par-ci, un nouveau personnage par-là , une nouvelle intrigue, un lieu ou une période différente : c’est comme écrire un roman, sauf que la matière première est réelle. Si enracié soit cette habitude à raconter des histoires, presque tout ce que les chercheurs ont découverts à leur sujet était en fait une totale fabrication de leur part. C’est du moins ce qu’ils pensent.
Sur le terrain, seuls les Jacks transportent les dispositifs permettant la création de trou de ver, bien que tous soient des experts capables de naviguer au milieu des terreurs hurlantes qui y résident. Ceci donne aux Jacks un rôle unique sur le terrain qui est la base du style de jeu de leur équipe. Pour un adversaire, cela crée un défi supplémentaire à relever, les trou de ver pouvant être empruntés par quiconque assez courageux pour le faire…
Souvenez-vous que vous pouvez jouer cette équipe comme les Wu-Ling Wanderers, ou comme n’importe quelle équipe de votre création. Les valeurs d’équipe restent les mêmes pour toutes les équipes Koris, bien que votre équipe sera la plus imprévisble. Ou pas ?
Un Coach qui possède plusieurs joueurs avec cette compétence dans son équipe peut placer un seul pion portail sur le terrain, avant le début du match. Placez-le dans votre moitié de terrain, derrière la ligne de départ.
Durant le match, un Coach peut placer un pion portail supplémentaire sur le terrain en dépensant un pion d’action d’équipe. Cela ne compte pas dans les limites du nombre de pion que l’on peut jouer sur un même joueur durant un Rush. Un nouveau portail doit être placé dans un hex vide, adjacent à un joueur de l’équipe dont c’est le Rush, avec la compétence Portail. Un maximum de trois portails peuvent être placé ainsi sur le terrain au même moment (même s’il y a plus d’une équipe pouvant en placer).
Les pions Portail ne peuvent pas être déplacé. Cependant, si un Coach dépense un pion d’action d’équipe pour en placer un, et qu’il y en a déjà trois sur le terrain, alors il peut enlever un pion portail existant et le replacer à un nouvel emplacement, en suivant les règles ci-dessous.
Lorsqu’un seul portail est sur le terrain, celui-ci ne conduit nul part, et il est considéré comme ‘‘inactif’’. Si un portail n’a pas d’hexes adjacent vide, alors il ne peut pas être utilisé comme destination. Il est alors considéré comme inactif. Aucun joueur ne peut se déplacer sur un hex contenant un portail inactif.
Un portail est potentiellement actif s’il y a des hexes vides adjacent à celui-ci. Pour devenir actif, il doit y avoir au moins un autre portail potentiellement actif sur le terrain. S’il y a seulement un portail potentiellement actif, alors celui-ci reste inactif jusqu’à ce qu’un autre portail soit placé. S’il y a deux ou trois portails actif sur le terrain, alors tous les portails deviennent actifs.
Les portails actifs sont reliés par un tunnel inter-dimensionnel invisible qui permet un déplacement instantanné entre eux. Un joueur qui se déplace sur un hex de portail actif comme s’il s’agissait d’un hex vide. Effectuez tous les tests d’échappée ou de dash nécessaires pour allez jusqu’au premier hex de portail. Si le Dash ou l’échappée pour entrer dans l’hex de portail est un échec, alors le joueur est mis au sol dans l’hex vers lequel il allait. Lorsque l’on calcule le nombre d’hex de déplacement d’un joueur pour cette action, comptez l’hex adjacent au second portail comme s’il s’agissait du même hex que le premier portail. Un déplacement à travers un portail ne termine pas automatiquement une action, bien qu’il puisse. Cela dépend du résultat du test de confusion (voir ci-dessous).
[insert diagram showing player moving through and number of movement it counts as]
Un joueur peut être repoussé dans un portail actif. Celui-ci le transportera de la même manière qu’un déplacement volontaire. Le joueur devra effectuer un test de confusion.
Test de Confusion : Un joueur qui se déplace dans un hex contenant un portail disparaît immédiatement. Où il termine son déplacement dépend de son entraînement, son expérience ou sa chance. Ceci est représenté par un test de confusion.
Lancez un Dé pour déterminer sur quelle valeur de jeu le test de confusion sera effectué.
• 1 : Force
• 2/3 : Rapidité
• 4/5 : Habilité
• 6 : Armure.
Confusion : test ‘‘?’’ à 3 dés (2)
• +2 si le joueur est un Tournoyeur.
• Test de Confusion réussit : Le joueur réapparaît dans un hex vide adjacent à un autre portail de son choix, dans l’orientation de son choix. Le joueur peut continuer son action à partir de ce point.
• Test de Confusion échoue : Le Coach adverse peut placer le joueur confu dans n’importe quel hex adjacent à un autre portail actif, avec une orientation déterminée aléatoirement (utilisez les règles de déviation pour cela). L’action du joueur confu s’arrête immédiatement et ce joueur ne peut pas agir jusqu’à la fin du Rush en cours.
Still no official comment about Portal Effects on Ball movement? I’m guessing you can’t throw it through a portal (no LOS)… but is Portal LOS Blocking? Can you use one to protect a Strike Zone? What about being pushed or shoved or misdirected into a Portal? Giants and Portals (guessing no, but you never know.. isn’t there a Giant Spider MVP coming… LOL!!??!!)
I played a match of Koris vs Mechanites with my son last night. It was a surprisingly balanced game, but it might have been more to do with my bad dice luck. We never tried to throw the ball through a portal, I would think that it would not go through it, but if the ball landed on a portal it would come out in another one of the opponent’s choosing, much like a failed passage. In the third rush we had a chance to have the Ref use the portal, and we took that, but after 2 uses we decided it needed a roll to prevent it from being over-powered. We decided on a 4-dice check, needing 2 successes on 4+, and it worked half of the time, so worth the attempt, but not a guarantee. The Mechanites tried to use the Portals three times: once with a foolish Guard (Skill and Speed both at 5+), who managed to roll a six and two threes on his Speed test, but the six rolled up to a 5, so he was fine, once with a Striker (Speed 4+, Skill 3+) who rolled Skill but managed to fail it, and once with a Jack (Skill 4+, Speed 4+, Strength 3+) who got Strength and made it. My Striker failed to get through safely on two separate occasions, but my Guards and Jacks had no problems. The ability to drop a portal with a Team Action token might be too powerful, but I liked the strategic implications. My Jack moves to pick up the ball, and does so, without doubling. I spend one action to have a forward-placed Jack open a Portal near the 3-point zone (actually, the central hex in the 3-point zone), then another token to open one next to my Jack with the ball. I still have 2 actions left, so I use one to get a card (hoping for a Jack or Striker Throw – I don’t) and my last action to have my ball-carrier move 1 Hex through the portal, make the check, and come out in position to throw in a 3-pointer (with only one die, but at Skill 3+? Sure!). Very interesting team, fun to play as. The Strength and Speed being a 4+ was a hindrance, but I think that was more my dice or going against 3+ Strength teams than anything else.
While interesting, playtesting the new teams against each other isn’t really telling. Both these teams are highly suspect to being too powerful right now. It’s more useful to have play experience against the current 16 rosters as we all know how those teams essentially fall in with the rest.
I agree that untested vs untested isn’t ideal for power rankings, but I’d rather untested vs untested than no testing at all… and often times Scoring is more about your own team and less about the opponent so we still gain some knowledge of the team just through using them. The fact that using the Portal is only a one hex “move” is something I hadn’t thought of.. so a Koris Jack (well, any jack, but as you’ve pointed out much harder to make Confusion checks if not a Koris) could place a Portal behind a decent guard or important MVP, then have another Portal manifest next to another Jack, then walk through that Portal and Slam the enemy in the back or (as in the little battle report above) use it to get into scoring position in just one hex move… so if you start in front of a player, Portal behind them to hit them, that’s a Sucker Punch, still, right? lol.. so as much as I agree not the most ideal playtest for balance, it did already bring up 2 options for the team I hadn’t seen just by looking at the stats & abilities.
Sucker punch is going to be VERY interesting with the Koris. Both players are gonna have to pay a lot of attention, and you’ll want to call foul well after the slam is committed. Of note, those Jack slams can also be pretty nasty with Gotcha guards.
I’m tellin’ folks, the Koris are packin’
Where I said well after the slam is committed, I should have phrased it “well after they have committed to the slam”. Do want to pull backsees!!
So… Could the Koris player spawn portals on all his own bonus hexes, thus preventing his opponent from scoring bonus strikes? That woukd be an easy way to keep your opponent’s scoring down. And you could leave a single guard in the 3-point zone, as his Gotha really hurts jacks and strikers trying to score.
I’d love an official word on portals in special zones. Strike zones, ball launch areas, and locker room exits.
I can see it being too powerful to block all your bonus point hexes… even just blocking the 4 pt hex is pretty potent… if the Koris want to put a “wall” of 3 portals in front of the bonus strike hex and throw some guards on the flanks of those walls.. I can see that as you are not utilizing your own portal movement…. and teams can go “around” your wall.. it also depends on LOS and Ball interaction… if you can throw “over” a portal it’s not as powerful as if it blocks LOS either..
Some more interesting Statistics:
At Ski 4+ and 5+, if you are moving and shooting at the rear strike hex w/ a Striker or planted with a Jack, it yields more points to shoot 3 point shots versus 4 point shoots on average.
Ski 5+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 167, 4 point – 133
Ski 4+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 225, 4 point – 200
When you move to Ski 3+, something interesting happens:
Ski 3+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 267, 4 point – 267
You are now at a point where you are so good at shooting 4 point shots, you no longer have a short term reason to fire a 3 if the 4 is available as they both yield the same amount over an extended period of time. Now let’s look at PLANTED strikers shooting 3s and 4s:
Ski 5+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 210, 4 point – 224
Ski 4+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 263, 4 point – 300
Ski 3+ points over a hundred shots: 3 point – 291, 4 point – 356
It’s no surprise Ski 3+ is much better then the rest, but it’s also to the point where 291 is about as much as you can even possibly GET out 100 shots (300 points possible if all are made). But here’s where the most damage is done: a team like the Veer-myn has good speed and move, allowing them to create the opportunity to try for those planted shots quite often. Where-as Human Strikers with their lower spd and mv are finding themselves running and gunning much more, so let’s compare those two lines:
Moving Ski 4+ Striker: 3 point – 225, 4 point – 200
Planted Ski 5+ Striker: 3 point – 210, 4 point – 224
Very comparible. There are some other things in play that make the two Human teams and the rats have variable amounts of success, but the “typical” scoring situation comparison is something you can work around and slowly pound out other disparities.
Now compare planted Koris Jacks and their Striker to planted Veer-myn:
Planted Ski 5+ Striker: 3 point – 210, 4 point – 224
Planted Ski 3+ Jack: 3 point – 267, 4 point – 267
Planted Ski 3+ Striker: 3 point – 291, 4 point – 356
Koris are going to get a lot of planted shots due to the fact they are gonna have doubled pick-ups constantly, portals set-up to utilize this extra action that can spit them out near the scoring zone, and with that skill 3 comes an auto proficiency at the passing game. Get that 2nd striker in a league and you practically don’t even need the portals. My apologies for not having the number prepared, but long bombs from striker to striker with ski 3 is I believe over an 80% completion rate (it’s a little harder to nail down the exact amount as exploding 6s make it difficult to account for how many dice the receiver might get on average since there is an infinite ceiling….needless to say, Rebs players already know they have an easy time winging the ball from frog to frog).
Layer in the fact that Ski 3+ isn’t losing rushes like other teams. Those Jacks have a 97% chance to pick up the ball (compared to 80% on Ski 5+ strikers, or 88% on Ski 4+ Jacks) and there is a good chance your Striker(s) won’t fumble the ball through the entire league.
Ski 3 just gives so many layers of advantage, I don’t need a bundle of games under my belt to let me know all these are inherent. A person can do well in leagues just by understanding statistical probabilities of their team and where they have the best chances of success, and these guys have all the tools to assist a moderate ski, and the high skill just makes them crazy good.
Did I mention anywhere the guards also have gotcha to get around their strength in the bash game? It also makes it super easy to man-mark spd 4+ and lower guards and jacks, forcing the other player to waste and/or risk wasting actions. The bash range of the 2nd guard to thump the guy the 1st guard is on is further exacerbated by these same portals, making them a reasonable bash threat. I don’t actually have a problem with the guards, I have an issue with having solid guards on a team with a solid special mechanic, that also doesn’t even NEED the mechanic due to the inherent stat they were given.
Skill 3 on an entire roster with an easy way to get into scoring position as is is just too powerful. Regardless oh how Jake rules on some of the portal nuances (which I noted in a prior post the test games I ran were the more toned down of the questions) these guys shouldn’t get released as written. Maybe some min/maxed Mech and Mutant teams can give them a solid challange (those are issues in and of themselves), but this team is so firmly top tier, it needs to be toned down. This is not the team to put Ski 3+ on down the line.
So, do you just recommend dropping skill to 4+? changing composition probably not that helpful as only 1 Striker and 2 Guards.. so drop Gotcha! on guards?
How about (and this adds more randomness so doesn’t address your concerns and stats directly) if the Portals are Unstable an tend to disappear.. either after use? or at start of a Rush (end of a Rush? but doesn’t that just penalize opponent who might want to use it.. or does that help when a Koris player tries to use the Portals defensively to block strike zones?)… what if 50/50 shot or at least 1/3 chance of Portal collapsing after use? What if 1d3 or 1d2 portals (to a minimum of 1?) collapsed at the end of the rush or start of the next rush? Would force Koris player to use more Activation Tokens and would force them to keep Jacks closer to were they want the Portals…
or, as you had suggested earlier, do you make the Portal Deployment an Action for the Koris Jack.. so you can’t have one Jack Dropping Portal near enemy Strike Zone, Sprinting to Ball & Picking it up, Dropping another Portal, and then stepping through Portal to make (non-planted, but still, 2/3 success per dice) Strike Attempt…
Certainly the 3+ skill is still going to be present and very helpful even if it takes the whole team working together to set up that Portal to Portal Strike Attempt …
Or maybe the simple answer is just reduce their Skill to 4+… I was just thinking of alternatives that would potentially be a hindrance and allow for the flavor of the team to be maintained while lowering their potentially superior performance. thanks for crunching the #s too!! very helpful!
Some good points/thoughts. The exact details of the portals and they need to operate are on hold in my mind as we don’t have every question answered. Some things could make sense to adjust, but even without the portals, I feel I could take this team into a league, never summon a portal, and kick major ass.
Before factoring exploding 6s, It’s 81%+ chance a striker catches a long bomb pass from a Ski 3+ jack. As soon as you get that 2nd Ski 3+ Striker, you no longer even have to bother with portals. It’s this deep pool of phenomenal ball handlers that IS the problem.
I don’t think gotcha should go. I like working “theme” in where you can. If this were a d20 system and the theme was they were better then average ball handlers, it’d be easier to make that shown without getting crazy. With the d6, making the shift is just so all or nothing. They go from “good” to “god”. It’s too drastic.
I’ll try to post the percentage chance of Ski 4+ Koris making it through those portals. But if it drops their chances too drastically, just giving them another die doesn’t seem unreasonable. When I crunched the numbers, it was only a 5+ stat had a 75% chance of success (that’s IF you roll for the 5 stat, which only happens 17% of the time) I remember 4s still being like 95% success rate off the top of my head, but I digress. There are options to making the confusion test easier on them if that’s part of the reason they had a Ski 3+.
The last thing to consider with skill 3 is the astounding number of fan checks you are gonna rack up scoring and doubling 3-4 pointers. These guys are almost a lock for the MVP, and coaching dice are gonna flow like the salmon of Capistrano.
I have an issue with how cheap they are as well. This is a very common theme with these OP teams. The costs just are really matching up against the field. Yes, I feel all the Season 1 teams need skills (obviously the FF are due for an update) but then why are we waiting to do that anyway. Even with that, The Guards trump Squids, more then just the 2, The Striker trumps Frogs as he’s 3mc cheaper and has a more mobile ability with the portals, and the Jacks, with skill 3, are the best jacks in the game, hands down. They are actually useful with kind of stat, but I don’t think Jacks should be getting fixed on a team by team basis, and if that is the thought and why they were given stat, I don’t feel it’s justified.
(Sorry, I realize that this is long, bare with me)
So they need to lose the card for sure if they stay at 3 Ski, BUT I would rather they have the card to be able to gel with the portals, keeping their prices, and having a Ski 4+ then raising the prices taking the card and leaving every thing else the same.
IF Jake disagrees, then the card does need to go and they need to increase in price. This would also slow down their growth in league and make it harder to maintain an extra guard and striker, which I would imagine most are gonna wanna do (I would cut a Jack, hire 3 more specialists and maintain a 2 striker, 4 guard, 4 Jack roster in league).
Thanks for bearing with me guys. I type because I care 😉
Nice idea but too much randomness and book keeping, especially having to roll the Stat required. It should be always the same (e.g. Skill). Instead of random placement, simply having the player fall in the hex would be enough and simpler.
I think spitting out in a unplanned location is more thematic, and as I’ve always advocated, changing something on the sole purpose of making it slightly easier to play is normally a bad idea. It doesn’t really gel with what is actually going on when someone enters the portal and gets confused in the other dimension.
I know people sometimes get uppity about extra rolls, but that really isn’t “book keeping”. You aren’t writing anything down as you roll the test immediately. Honestly, I already have the chart memorized after 3 matches, so I don’t really think that is too big of a problem. This isn’t nearly to the same level of the zees, which is understandable you have the concern as they are a pain as written.
For me, this was the least bit of my concern as the mechanic actually makes it easier for Jacks and guards to get threw over strikers (since strikers always have that 5 armor) but doesn’t pick on any teams inherent lack of a particular statistic. Why would rats, Orx, Grogan, or any other myriad of players with Ski 5+ just be that inherently bad at getting through the portals while Ralarat are phenomenal? The random stat generation is, to me, a good call to make it fair for all opposing teams.
Ok, that was one of my favorites testing matches. Lots of fun!
Again, with our second game, we’ve made some changes (as our others games, it was against Corporation 1).
So, we conclued that the Portal counter couldn’t be on colored hexes, as for the Ref.
We can’t throw the ball through a Portal, but it could be really funny to throw to a player through a Portal. We could try for fun, but we’ve to think about the possibility that the ball could exit from the bad portal! ^_^
We’ve changed the Koris Skill to 4+, except for the Striker, still with his Skill 3+.
The game was more balanced with theses tiny changes.
I think that one of the most balanced team of the new ones.
(we have to try the Crystallans this afternoon!)
I know there are plenty of teams with models with different stat lines (due to different races or sub-species of the race)… but for consistency sake I can’t condone making Koris Jacks (and Guards I guess) Skill 4+ and keeping Strikers at 3+… to me it’s all or nothing.. I’m going to assume for sanity’s sake that the Portals cannot be placed on Yellow or Red Hexes, and that the ball cannot go through them (again, fluff wise, need a sentient creature to activate portal)… whether they block LOS or just are treated like prone players (only scatter ball if it lands on them) .. I kinda think it should be treated like a Prone Player…
2ndly, I’m totally okay with a change in costs.. but even if you up the cost of each model by 1 (heck, you can increase jacks to 13 mc) you can still have a 100 mc team with no extras…
but honestly, in Season 4 with the Cheer Checks and Fans and Cheerleaders and Coaches and all of that, making a single check for a collapsing Portal or making a check after the model goes through a portal (or heck, just auto collapsing one of the ends of the portal each time it is used) isn’t more bookkeeping.. it’s just a single die roll.. and also, I don’t see how the Confusion Check is really that confusing.. I have to look up Steal and Throwing the Ball at Opponents every time I do it.. if I was a Koris Player I’d just print off the Confusion Check rules and have it with me for every game…
So to me, the question is do you need all of these fixes? just some of them?
Team sits at 99 mc right now.. drop card.. 89.. increase cost of Jacks by 1, so they are 12 mc, so now at 94 mc.. stay there, and buy a dice for 6? or is giving them a Coaching Dice dumb as they will be generating Fan Checks anyway?
Okay … so up cost of Jacks again to 13 mc and bump Guard up to 12 mc… 100 mc team…
Is that fair? or still too powerful… so now adjust Portal Mechanic…
Options are 1) require it to be an Action by Acting Jack… no one has commented on that recently… and/or 2) have Portals Collapse… either after use automatically.. on a check (seems to be uncommon mechanic in Dreadball…) … or have 1d2 collapse at the beginning of the Koris Team’s Rush to a minimum of 1 Portals…
Thoughts? Does point cost change AND Portal Collapse make them too weak? or as Earth Dragon stated, even a Move 5, Skill 3+ team is competitive regardless of Portals…
Yep, after many games with them, you were far right on same Skill level for all Koris. I think 4+ is good for thems. No need of 3+ IMHO
After Don’s game report below I also like the idea of applying -1 to the Confusion Test per Threat Hex on the exit Portal and like the idea of applying -1 to the Confusion Test per additional Portal a player tries to use in a single Rush…. but then do you also have Portals Collapse? Require Jack to spend Action? or just change skill to 4+… so many options =p
Trontek vs. Koris game report!
As a note, for the purposes of this game we ruled that portals could not be placed on any of the special hexes. ie:Any strike zone hex, any ball launch hex, or the exit to the subs bench hex.
Koris got to be the home team. They placed their first portal near their own 1 point strike zone, just 5 hexes away from their subs bench exit. (Tricky, tricky) Their first action, was to sprint a jack down the pitch, then used a team action to drop a portal right next to Trontek’s 4 point hex. This set up a portal that would allow them to traverse darn near the entire pitch in one step. Later in the game the Koris set up another portal near the ball launch area. Now they could exit the reserve area, step into a portal, emerge near the ball launch, then pick up the ball. Gaining a free action, because they are skill 3 so it was easy for them to do. Then jump back into that portal and emerge in either the 3 or 4 point strike hex. All with a single action!!! Ironically, it was a Trontek guard that was the first player to travel via portal, and he came out just fine!
The game itself was a close affair, with neither team getting more than 3 points ahead at any point. Trontek was up by two going into rush 13, the Koris’ last rush. They managed a 3 point strike and now had the advantage heading into the final rush. Trontek managed to free a trapped striker, and he got the ball. He set himself up for a 2 point strike to win the game and came up empty! Koris wins 1 – 0.
I thought that only having one striker would be the Koris’ undoing. It was not. Even when that striker went off for a few turns the jacks, with a combination of skill 3 and very strategic use of the portals, kept the show, and the scores, rolling. I will say that traversing the portals was no big deal to the Koris. Getting the 2 bonus dice on those checks really helps them. In fact I think it’s too good. The bonus should be reduced to 1. Only once was I ever concerned about that test, and that was when it was done on the armor value of the striker! He failed. Skill 3 is great, and I’d almost say too great, but bumping it down to 4 seems like too much to me. So in the end the only change I’d make would be bumping the spinner bonus from 2 down to 1.
what about have threat hexes affect the confusion test? either threat hexes on the portal itself, to represent opponents whacking you as you enter or exit the portal? also gives an additional reason to “guard” the portal .. so if opponent kept a guard or jack adjacent to the 3-4 point strike zone portal, would reduce the # of locations you could place model and reduce the success rate a bit … also.. do you drop the ball if you come out of a portal Confused? Might be a good idea to make that true.. so if the Koris does fail the Confusion check the also lose the ball and their Rush in most cases.
other thought is similar to a dash or evade – make the variable (2) confusion test either needs (3) successes if doing 2 portals in one “action” or make a -1 modifier for each portal you move through during the Rush or Action… won’t happen too too often but just a tweak to reduce the chance for multi-portal linking on doubles… in theory you could sprint to a portal that linked to a portal next to the ball, double the pick up, and hop back into that portal to then appear on a strike hex and make a strike attempt.. all with 1 action as you mentioned.. becomes slightly riskier if you are ball carrier and trying to link portals especially if end portal is in a threat hex or two of the opponent…
What about limiting the distance for portal placement to 2x your movement? Or only having them open if all hexes around them are open?